Growing healthy food, people, and communities . . .

2013 NAACP Image Awards nominee for autobiography/biography.

Goodreads Choice finalist for best food book of the year.

Summary:

The Good Food Revolution is the story of Will Allen's personal journey, the lives he has touched, and a grassroots movement that is changing the way our nation eats. The son of a sharecropper, Allen had no intention of ever becoming a farmer. But after years in professional basketball and as an executive for Kentucky Fried Chicken and Procter & Gamble, he cashed in his retirement fund for a two-acre plot just outside Milwaukee's largest public housing project.

Despite financial challenges and daunting odds, Allen built an urban farm, a food and educational center that now produces enough produce and fish year-round to feed thousands. Employing young people from the community, Allen's organization, Growing Power, shows how local food systems can help troubled youths, dismantle racism, create jobs, bring urban and rural communities closer together, and improve public health. Today Growing Power helps develop community food systems across the country.

Reviews:

"What Allen does with a small plot of land and a lot of determination is nothing short of inspiring... A moving story of one man's success in producing healthy food for those who need it most." --Kirkus Reviews

"Allen gives readers the personal, moving account of a man whose family became part of the last century's great migration of African Americans out of the South. Of a man who traded a successful life in the corporate world for the economic uncertainties of a small farmer... The Good Food Revolution is inspiring." --Los Angeles Times

“From the plots of his Milwaukee urban farm to low-income communities across America, Will Allen has shown us a new type of heroism. Through The Good Food Revolution, Allen recounts his effort to reclaim his family’s heritage and, in doing so, confront lingering disparities in racial and economic justice. As the champion of a new and promising movement, Allen is skillfully leading Americans to face one of our greatest domestic issues – our health.” – Former President Bill Clinton